Center Field Triangle

Center Field Triangle

Center field fly catchers dread having to chase a well-struck ball to the deepest part of Fenway Park. The center field triangle is located to the left of the Red Sox bullpen, 420 feet from home plate. A ball that falls safely into play inside the triangle usually means at minimum a triple, even for the slowest afoot; one bad bounce, and you could be looking at an inside-the-park home run.

What also poses a challenge is not the 17-foot-high bleacher wall but the bullpen fence that slopes from about nine feet down to five feet leading away from the wall; many fielders keeping their eyes too long on the ball have found themselves stopped dead in their tracks with the wind knocked out of them, again as the ball bounces around like a pinball. Oddly enough, a “bad” bounce can also spell bad luck for a batter who watches a well-struck ball bounce into the bullpen, which means that a sure triple becomes “only” a double.